CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.

We question the premature apostrophe in a banner made in honor of the recently incarcerated singer/songwriter Boy George. In the purple ribbon, the apostrophe appositely hovers between the O and the Dowd, but the mark skips ahead one place in the initials (perhaps to indicate hopes for an early release from prison). Does the unexpected period between the O and D subliminally suggest an abbreviation for "overdose," as drugs figured into the charges? In any case, here's a "get out of jail free" card for you, Boy George.

Quirky lexiconographer and language fanatic Craig Conley pays homage to the oft-forgotten and overlooked symbol of the word "and", the lowly ampersand, in his entertaining and fascinating book Ampersand.

* The ampersand is the "single feature most useful to examine first when looking for writers' handwriting idiosyncrasies, or when comparing two examples of writing to check whether they are in the same hand" (Peter Beal, A Dictionary of English Manuscript Terminology)

* In olden times, children learning to write their alphabets would always end with the ampersand

Funny, absorbing and informative, Ampersand is a 93-page book that belongs on the shelf of everyone who loves etymology and curious tomes. And it's a safe bet that Ampersand would be a great gift for book lovers, too, since it's the only book (that I'm aware of) that is devoted entirely to &.

* A manual for typographers published in 1917 acknowledged that there are many beautiful forms of the ampersand, yet it forbade their use in "ordinary book work." Extraordinary books are another matter. Our lavishly illustrated Ampersand opus explores the history and pictography of the most common coordinating conjunction.

* Ellipses don’t merely omit superfluous words or mark pauses. Far from
it! In an astonishing number of cases, the ellipses illustrate a
narrative, inviting the reader to “connect the dots.” Learn more about Annotated Ellipses at Amazon.com.

* A manual for typographers published in 1917 acknowledged that there are many beautiful forms of the ampersand, yet it forbade their use in "ordinary book work." Extraordinary books are another matter. Our lavishly illustrated Ampersand opus explores the history and pictography of the most common coordinating conjunction.

INSTRUCTIONS:In
alternate turns, complete a row, column, or diagonal with three X’s or
O’s. Each X and O has a discrete unit of meaning, as detailed in the Dictionary of One-Letter Words.
Choose and write a letter meaning alongside each X and O placed in the
grid; don’t repeat a letter meaning within the same game. Number each turn on the grid, to establish the linear progression of the story. When the game is finished, use the sequence of key words to construct your story, adding connecting phrases as necessary.

"The shed went quiet save for the pfft of Paul dragging on his cigarette." —Screwthedaisies, Things Inside.

* The British expression "noise stroke gesture" (in American parlance, "noise slash gesture" or "noise/gesture") refers to the intriguing fact
that some vocal expressions seem to call for an accompanying hand
gesture. Take, for example, Pfft! No matter what its intended meaning, it virtually demands to be echoed in sign language. Have you noticed a pfft hand gesture in print? Please share!

For a variety of surprising definitions of pfft, check out my Dictionary of All-Consonant Words at OneLetterWords.com.

Looks like the artist for a new British release of My Dinner with Andre misread "dinner" as "diner." There's certainly no "Soup of the Day" sign at the swanky restaurant in the film! And that coat check lady looks as thin as a rail!

I always have thought of punctuation as the most mystical of writing. More mysterious than words, punctuation points to the interstices between words, to the secret passages between things, to structure and breath, the kings of incense and smoke in the hidden chamber.

Printed collections of Forgotten Wisdom diagrams are available: Volume I from Mindful Greetings and Volumes II, III and IV from Amazon. Selected posters are also available via Zazzle.

* The most profound secrets lie not wholly in knowledge, said the poet. They lurk invisible in that vitalizing spark, intangible, yet as evident as the lightning—the seeker's soul. Solitary digging for facts can reward one with great discoveries, but true secrets are not discovered—they are shared, passed on in confidence from one to another. The genuine seeker listens attentively. No secret can be transcribed, save in code, lest it—by definition—cease to be. This Book of Whispers collects and encodes more than one hundred of humankind's most cherished secrets. To be privy to the topics alone is a supreme achievement, as each contains and nurtures the seed of its hidden truth. As possessor and thereby guardian of this knowledge, may you summon the courage to honor its secrets and to bequeath it to one worthy.

* A manual for typographers published in 1917 acknowledged that there are many beautiful forms of the ampersand, yet it forbade their use in "ordinary book work." Extraordinary books are another matter. Our lavishly illustrated Ampersand opus explores the history and pictography of the most common coordinating conjunction.

* The British expression "noise stroke gesture" (in American parlance, "noise slash gesture" or "noise/gesture") refers to the intriguing fact
that some vocal expressions seem to call for an accompanying hand
gesture. Take, for example, Pfft! No matter what its intended meaning, it virtually demands to be echoed in sign language. Have you noticed a pfft hand gesture in print? Please share!

For a variety of surprising definitions of pfft, check out my Dictionary of All-Consonant Words at OneLetterWords.com.

Answer:New York Times. “How the New York Times’ Straight Approach to the News is Funnier than Mad Magazine’s Self-conscious Approach to Boffo Laughs.” (The answer is in black text on the black background. Highlight it to view.)

* Ellipses don’t merely omit superfluous words or mark pauses. Far from
it! In an astonishing number of cases, the ellipses illustrate a
narrative, inviting the reader to “connect the dots.” Learn more about Annotated Ellipses at Amazon.com.

"Cancer came into its own with the Industrial Revolution, a cancer model dedicated to producing identical replicas on an assembly line. The analogy carries over to human cells and replication, as solid as auto parts, tin cans, bottles and printed words." —William Burroughs, The Western Lands

"I rather enjoy that sense of bewilderment a novel gives you when you start reading it, but if the first effect is fog, I'm afraid the moment the fog lifts my pleasure in reading will be lost, too."—Italo Calvino, If On a Winter's Night a Traveler (Why not mention again how marvelous this book is?!)

"There ought to be a book devoted to the histories of those who have not received half their proper fame. It would make a curious volume, at once old in the materials, novel in the interest, and of equal delight and use."—William Harrison Ainsworth, Ainworth's Magazine, Vol. 5, 1844, p. 458.

"The function of dreams, they tell us, is to unlearn or purge the brain of unneeded connections—according to this view what goes through the mind in a dream is merely the result of a sort of neural housecleaning. They also suggest that it may be damaging to recall dreams, because doing so might strengthen mental connections that should be discarded. 'We dream in order to forget,' they write." —William Burroughs, The Western Lands

* A manual for typographers published in 1917 acknowledged that there are many beautiful forms of the ampersand, yet it forbade their use in "ordinary book work." Extraordinary books are another matter. Our lavishly illustrated Ampersand opus explores the history and pictography of the most common coordinating conjunction.

* The most profound secrets lie not wholly in knowledge, said the poet. They lurk invisible in that vitalizing spark, intangible, yet as evident as the lightning—the seeker's soul. Solitary digging for facts can reward one with great discoveries, but true secrets are not discovered—they are shared, passed on in confidence from one to another. The genuine seeker listens attentively. No secret can be transcribed, save in code, lest it—by definition—cease to be. This Book of Whispers collects and encodes more than one hundred of humankind's most cherished secrets. To be privy to the topics alone is a supreme achievement, as each contains and nurtures the seed of its hidden truth. As possessor and thereby guardian of this knowledge, may you summon the courage to honor its secrets and to bequeath it to one worthy.

Whiterosesandredroses:thosewerebeautifulcolourstothinkof.. . .Lavenderandcreamandpinkroseswerebeautifultothinkof.Perhapsawildrosemightbelikethosecoloursandherememberedthesongaboutthewildroseblossomsonthelittlegreenplace.Butyoucouldnothaveagreenrose.Butperhapssomewhereintheworldyoucould.—James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, 1916.

* Though printed in black and white, great literature is bursting with vibrant colour. In this rebus-style puzzle, color words and parts of words have been replaced with colored boxes. Try to guess the exact hue of each. Roll your mouse over the colored boxes to reveal the missing words. Click the colored boxes to learn more about each hue. Special thanks to Paul Dean for his colorful research.

"There may be no torture like the years when one learns little after years when one has learned much."—Norman Mailer, Ancient Evenings (Thanks to Wilfried Hou Je Bek for recommending this astonishing work.)

* A manual for typographers published in 1917 acknowledged that there are many beautiful forms of the ampersand, yet it forbade their use in "ordinary book work." Extraordinary books are another matter. Our lavishly illustrated Ampersand opus explores the history and pictography of the most common coordinating conjunction.

"The ampersand dreams. Mother & child, the primordial &, a mother’s arms around her child, the Mobius umbilical, the inside out, the turning a portrait of itself, the between one thing and another, the and other connected, the hand and its other, the breath and its shadow, the shadow's curl, the ampersand." —Gary Barwin

"Never fight fear head-on. ... Let it in and look at it. What shape is it? What color? Let it wash through you. Move back and hang on. Pretend it isn't there. Get trivial. ... There are many ways to distance yourself from fear. Keep silence and let fear talk. You will see it by what it does. Death doesn't like to be seen that close. Death must always elicit surprised recognition: 'You!' The last person you expected to see, and at the same time, who else? When de Gaulle, after an unsuccessful machine-gun attack on his car, brushed splintered glass off his shoulder and said, 'Encore!,' Death couldn't touch him."—The Western Lands

* The British expression "noise stroke gesture" (in American parlance, "noise slash gesture" or "noise/gesture") refers to the intriguing fact
that some vocal expressions seem to call for an accompanying hand
gesture. Take, for example, Pfft! No matter what its intended meaning, it virtually demands to be echoed in sign language. Have you noticed a pfft hand gesture in print? Please share!

For a variety of surprising definitions of pfft, check out my Dictionary of All-Consonant Words at OneLetterWords.com.